CONNECTING THE DOTS

Scarcity: Humanity’s Final Chapter?

Book review—Scarcity:
Humanity’s Final Chapter? By Chris O. Clugston

Part 1: How did we get this far?

Without any consideration for future generations, we Americans
accelerate our water, metal, mineral, resource and energy usage at ever
increasing rates of speed. While we cram
our cities with endless people, few Americans understand that fresh water must
come from somewhere to provide drinking, washing and sewage disposal. Few give it a second thought as to where
gasoline, natural gas and electricity originate. Finally, very few Americans give
non-renewable resources that power this civilization—a moment’s notice.

We imitate an airplane filled to capacity with people starting
out on a long journey from New York City to London, England, which takes about
eight hours, but the ground crew mistakenly filled the tanks with enough fuel
to fly for four hours or half the trip.
Everything feels fine for the passengers and captain until 4:01 into the
flight. At that point, “Ladies and
gentlemen, please take your seats; grab your flotation gear and start praying,
because we just ran out of fuel…we are headed for a crash landing in the
Atlantic Ocean….”

Right now, around the world, many civilizations with over
2.1 billion people, suffer lack of drinkable water, enough food and energy to
support their citizens. How did they get
there? Why didn’t they do something to
change course? What made them victims? Can they save themselves once they pass 4:01
hours on their flight across the fail-safe point of a civilization’s existence?

The answers to those questions arrive in a new book—Scarcity: Humanity’s Final Chapter? by
Christopher O. Clugston. With brilliant
clarity, he discusses how America and all of Western civilizations run on
non-renewable resources that cannot be duplicated, replaced or created. Once those resources run out, all of us face
the same fate as the people in the airplane over the Atlantic Ocean that runs
out of fuel.

“Our modern industrial existence is enabled by enormous and
continuously increasing quantities of non-renewable resources—fossil fuels,
metals and nonmetallic minerals. NNRs
serve as the raw material inputs to our industrialized economies, as the
building blocks that comprise our industrial infrastructure and support
systems, and as the primary energy sources that power our industrialized
societies,” said Clugston. “Ironically,
since the inception of our industrial revolution over 200 years, we have been
eliminating—persistently and increasingly—the finite and non-replenishing NNRs
upon which our industrialized way of life and our very existence depend.”

To place our predicament in perspective, we humans add one
billion of ourselves every 12 years on our way from 7.1 billion in 2013 to 10.1
billion by 2050—a scant 37 years.
America, the world’s third fastest growing country behind India and
China, expects to add 100 million within 25 years and 138 million to reach 438
million by 2050. At current growth rates, America will double in the lifetime
of a child born in 2013, to over 625 million as a low projection and to a high
of 669 million by 2095. (Source: US Population Projections by Fogel/Martin)

To gallop toward such a catastrophic population explosion in
light of current environmental, water and energy depletions can only be seen as
what Erik Davis referred to as, “Consensus trance.” With such definite realities facing us and
very close at hand, how could an educated and free people with limitless news
media and academic institutions choose to ignore our harsh realities?

James Howard Kunstler, author of The Long Emergency, said, “Mostly it is a matter of cultural
inertia, aggravated by collective delusion, and nursed in the growth medium of
comfort and complacency."

In other words, we think everything we enjoy today, much
like the assumption of the passengers on that doomed “half-full fuel tanks”
airplane—will continue. After reading
Clugston’s book, he proves that those resources will NOT be there for future
generations.

“As a result, most of the Earth’s NNRs have become
permanently scarce—there are not enough globally available, economically viable
NNR supplies to completely address humanity’s global NNR requirements for going
forward,” said Clugston. “Because the natural
resource utilization behavior that enables our current “success”—i.e. our industrialized
way of life—and that is essential to perpetuating our success, is simultaneously undermining our very
existence. Neither our natural resource
utilization behavior nor our industrial paradigm is sustainable. This is our predicament.”

This book rivets you to your seat. This book sobers you to the fate of your
children. This book cannot be
ignored. It cannot be disproven in light
of the facts and sources provided. If
Clugston piloted the plane about to fly over the Atlantic, he checked all the
tanks to ensure “filled-up!” But since
others like our president and Congress maintain full control of the United
States of America—we won’t make it to our destination. Unless….

Our president, U.S. Congress, governors and all national
leaders need to read this book for the survival of our civilization. If not, we all face the same fate as the
passengers in the plane flying over the Atlantic. We’re probably over three
hours into our fateful flight in 2013.

Part: 2 NNR scarcity
is the most daunting challenge every to confront humanity. If we Homo sapiens
are truly an exceptional species, now is the time to prove it.

Frosty Wooldridge has bicycled across six
continents - from the Arctic to the South Pole - as well as eight times across
the USA, coast to coast and border to border. In 2005, he bicycled from the
Arctic Circle, Norway to Athens, Greece. In 2012, he bicycled coast to coast
across America. He presents “The Coming
Population Crisis facing America: what to do about it.” www.frostywooldridge.com
. His latest book is: How to Live a Life
of Adventure: The Art of Exploring the World by Frosty Wooldridge, copies at 1
888 280 7715/ Motivational program: How to Live a Life of Adventure: The
Art of Exploring the World by Frosty Wooldridge, click:www.HowToLiveALifeOfAdventure.com

Thanks to pollution, over fishing, climate change and oil spills, our oceans are close to the tipping point. If you add in water scarcity and that corporations are buying up fresh water resources around the world, we are pretty much screwed. The mainstream media hardly mentions any of this and besides, most Americans are too ignorant or too busy to pay attention. One day we'll wake up and the domination by multinational corporations will be complete and we'll be slaves again.